Extreme times promote extreme behaviour. He was a terrible human, and the regime he was fighting was too.

The regime he was fighting was far too humane for its own good, that is quite obvious in retrospect. Stalin, however, is not a black and white figure for Russian/Soviet history. On the one hand yes, there were purges, and a large famine on his watch. Millions perished. But on the other he industrialized the country and won WW2, which most likely would be impossible without industrialization. I wish there were easier answers to these moral questions, but there never are if one thinks in more than one dimension

> The regime he was fighting was far too humane for its own good

Compared to communist Russia, maybe, but it was cruel, unequal and badly run by every measure I can think of. I don’t think you can describe it as ‘humane’ by any real measure except comparison with what followed.